China to expand crop rotation and fallow systems trials

* China will expand trials of crop rotation and fallow systems to cover 24 million mu (1.6 million hectares) of land in 2018, official news agency Xinhua reported on Friday

* That would double the area of land covered by similar trials in 2017, Xinhua reported, citing agriculture minister Han Changfu

* China launched trials of the programmes in 2016 and expanded them last year to 10 million mu for crop rotation and 2 million mu for fallow land

* The crop rotation trials are mainly applied in the northeastern areas, between corn and soybeans

* The fallow land trials are carried out in areas in Hebei province suffering from underground water shortages, fields in Hunan province polluted by heavy metals, and seriously degraded areas in northwestern and southwestern China

* Beijing will also keep improving the quality of arable land and strengthening soil pollution management and recovery in the new year, Xinhua said (Reporting by Hallie Gu and Dominique Patton; editing by Richard Pullin)